By Wesley Prater

As a guy from Mississippi, it’s been a bit disappointing to hear about the ideological opposition from Governors in Southern states (with the exception of Arkansas) to accept federal money to cover more uninsured families through Medicaid. But let’s not assume that most Southerners are opposed to accepting this Medicaid option. In fact, it may be the complete opposite. According to the results from a survey co-released by Families USA and the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, there is strong public support for Medicaid expansion and other provisions of the Affordable Care Act in the five states that make up the “Deep South” (Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and South Carolina).

The survey showed that nearly two-thirds (62.3%) of adults in the Deep South had favorable views of Medicaid expansion. Yes, you read that correctly – nearly two-thirds of the respondents in the Deep South support Medicaid expansion, including majorities in all five states. Even though only one-third of those surveyed had a favorable view of the ACA overall, there was strong support of other provisions of the ACA, including health insurance exchanges (75% favorable), and subsidies (68.8% favorable).

So it seems like the public gets it in the Deep South, yet their Governors are choosing to go with ideological reasons to oppose the Medicaid option. We already know that Republican governors in states like Arizona, Florida, New Jersey, New Mexico, and Ohio said that accepting federal funding to extend Medicaid coverage to more uninsured is the best thing for their states. Hopefully more Governors in the Deep South will eventually feel the same.

To learn more about the results of the survey, take a look here.